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U.S. consul general Bernard Alter explains new visa interview system at U.S. Embassy Information Resource Center in Yongsan.
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With interview exemptions for Korean U.S. visa applicants set to be largely cancelled from next week, all Koreans applying for U.S. visas will have to submit mandatory fingerprint scans at the U.S. Embassy in Korea from late August.
Moreover, it will be possible to make interview appointments for non-immigrant visas only through the Internet. Previously, one could do so over the phone.
At a press conference Friday morning at the U.S. Embassy Information Resource Center in Namyeong-dong, consul general Bernard Alter said most of the interview exemption programs for Koreans applying for non-immigrant visas would be cancelled from August 1, while new requisites would go into effect from August 2.
Accordingly, only those applicants under 14 with at least one parent who is a U.S. visa holder, those over 80 years old, or those Korean government officials (and their accompanying family members) who are visiting the U.S. on official passports would be exempt from the visa interviews.
Currently, those under 16 and those over 55 are exempt from interviews.
Before July 2003, only 35 percent of non-immigrant visa applicants had to take interviews at the U.S. Embassy, but after certain exemption programs were terminated, that percentage rose to 65 percent, and with these measures, the percentage of non-immigrant visa applicants who must take interviews will leap to 95 percent.
Alter said the visa conditions were the result of the importance placed on national security following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
About concerns that there might be delays in the issuing of visas with the mass reduction in visa interview exemptions, Alter said the embassy would strive to maintain the current five-day issuing period following the interview by opening up three new interview windows and hiring more staff by January.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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